All The Wonder That I Want
by transemacabre
Summary: Set shortly after RAW 9/24/12. It's not all over between AJ and Kane, as they encounter one another following her confrontation with CM Punk.


Everything was just as it always was, a hundred thousand times before: the groan of the metal steps beneath his weight, the steady beat of his great heart, the underlit basement and the flickering lights in their fixtures. At last, safely alone, Kane ripped off his mask and sucked in the stale air threw his teeth. Here, he was in his element. Alone, bigger than life and uglier than sin. Alone alone alone. His hands, fit only for causing pain, not pleasure - balled into fists. His instincts told him to lash out when he was in pain, but the pain Kane lived with came solely from his troubled mind.

The great basement beneath the arena was his refuge. Dimly lit, and filled with old machinery and twisting corners, Kane could get lose in here and hide - hide from everyone but himself. He had not gone far when he heard the door open and close, and footsteps making their way down the stairs into the basement. _His_ basement. Fury shot through his veins like blood poisoning. Had someone followed him? Who would dare? But no one called out his voice, challenged him to a match. He heard only the soft rustle of cloth, and a breathy sound, and that was all.

Kane stepped out of the shadows. There, sitting on the bottom-most step, was _her_. His mad girl. AJ.

She was bent over, her brown hair covering her face, her bare legs sticking out before her. She seemed to him like nothing so much as a moth, fallen from the sky, wings crumpled and too exhausted to take flight. Yes, a moth, not a fanciful butterfly, but a dark and powder-soft moth, burnt by that which she loved.

She lifted her head to look at him, her eyes filled with misery, and even in the dimness of the basement, he could see the set of her mouth, the way she held herself. AJ was in pain. His hands opened and closed involuntarily. Kane wanted to hold her in his arms, his damaged moth. He wanted to hurt anyone who'd hurt her. He wanted to run away like a scared child.

"AJ", he said. It was not a question.

She looked as though she were trying to smile at him. "I'm sorry for intruding," and that was all she said before her lips twisted and she had to pause to get herself under control.

Somehow his legs carried him to her. Kane knelt before AJ. They sat in companionable silence for a few moments.

"I thought he couldn't hurt me like this," AJ said, very softly. She sounded as though she wondered at it. "I was wrong. How could I have been so wrong, Kane?"

"I'm not... really the best person to ask," he told her. His voice sounded unnaturally deep and harsh in here. He couldn't think of a single thing to say to make anything better. He'd never had the words before in his life, so why would he now.

AJ hesitated before replying. "Have you - has something like this ever happened to you?"

Kane frowned. Every personal relationship he'd had in his life - his brother, Torrie, _Lita _- the wounds were raw still. Normally, he would retreat within himself, hide behind his walls, or blow up at someone and wreck havoc. But with AJ, nothing was normal, the world was tilted and off-axis and none of his old tricks worked. "Yes. Yes, I know how you feel."

He lifted his eyes and found her staring at him, with that look on her face that he'd seen several times and couldn't understand. It was as though AJ was seeing him and not seeing him at the same time. Kane tore his eyes away from her, unable to take it. Kane had driven her away, that was undeniable. The things she made him feel, the way she made him act, he felt weak. Kane had never been an overtly sexual man - he'd desired Lita more for the life and child he had wanted with her than for her body - but being around AJ made him _shake_. He'd had mad impulses to hold her in his bruising arms, to kiss her and cover her with his body until they merged into one being. He'd wanted to be flesh of her flesh, blood of her blood, of one mind, body, soul. Dying would not have scared him as much.

So he'd driven her away, into the arms of a lesser man. Kane cringed.

AJ shifted, and even as he looked up, he felt the tips of her fingers brush against his face. Her nails gleamed in the flickering light. "You can't, AJ, you can't," he whispered, but he wasn't sure what he was begging her not to do. He only knew that if she had all of him, he'd be torn asunder.

"I meant what I said." Her fingers trailed along his jaw, touched his lips. "You're the only one who never hurt me." Her hand moved upwards, to brush between his eyes. He leaned unconsciously into her touch. "None of it was a lie, Kane. Not a single moment." Her hands glided along the back of his skull, and her warm breath mingled with his.

Kane's hands grasped her tiny waist; she was so fragile. She moved with him, laying herself across the steps so that he could brace himself over her, supporting his weight on his elbows. Their lips met, and as he pulled away their noses bumped a little, making her smile and the corners of her eyes crinkle. He sat up. "You will be the death of me, AJ."

She watched him through half-lidded eyes, that same sphinx-like look on her face. "This thing between me and you," she murmured. "It's not over. Not yet. Don't push me away again. Don't hurt me. Kane..."

Kane found himself shaking. How could he tell her, it wasn't _her_ that he feared getting hurt.


End file.
